Ohio: Man lets city clear junk

COH & ACOA Joined: Jul 22, 2006 Posts: 2032 Location: Cabo

Man lets city clear junk
BY DAN HORN | DHORN@ENQUIRER.COM

http://news.enquirer.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080515/NEWS01/805150302

WESTWOOD - The scrap metal and rusting lawn mowers are gone now from Ron Brown's yard.

So are the weeds, the litter and the abandoned car that had been there so long that its tires sank into the ground.

A small convoy of trucks hauled away the debris surrounding Brown's Westwood home two weeks ago, ending one of Cincinnati's longest and ugliest building-code fights.

The battle lasted more than a decade and involved countless building inspectors, neighborhood activists, police and, finally, a Hamilton County judge who twice sent Brown to jail for ignoring his orders.

"The amount of debris and junk on that property was amazing," Municipal Court Judge Russell Mock said.

• Photos: Cincinnati eyesore

Brown's dispute with the city went on so long that it helped change the way the city and the courts deal with persistent building-code violators.

Building inspectors say they have ratcheted up enforcement throughout the city, more than doubling the number of criminal complaints they bring against repeat offenders such as Brown.

Mock said the case inspired him to explore the creation of a treatment program for violators who show signs of obsessive compulsive disorder or other mental problems that might lead them to hoard junk on their property.

His hope is that counseling, rather than a jail sentence, will encourage repeat offenders to follow the rules.

"A tool that would allow the court to resolve these cases without locking people up would be a great thing," Brown's lawyer, Don Caster, said.

"Somebody like Mr. Brown is not a danger to the community."

Brown, however, said his case isn't about an illness or a wanton disregard for the law. He said it's about city officials and a few neighborhood activists singling out a 70-year-old man as a threat to the neighborhood.

"The whole thing is a big joke," Brown said. "I had stuff in my yard that I shouldn't have had. But it's a matter of priorities.

"They should be concerned about crime. They shouldn't be worried about what somebody has in his yard."

Brown said he accumulated the lawn mowers, cars and car parts in his yard on McHenry Avenue over many years and never considered them a problem.

He said he fought city efforts to get the property cleaned up because he thought the process was unfair and the law was unevenly applied. He said he would have kept fighting if not for the threat of a third stint in jail.

"It was done like the Gestapo," Brown said. "I was never unwilling to clean the place up. It just wasn't fast enough for them."

DIFFERENT VIEWS OF THE JUNK

Building inspectors and court officials tell a different story.

They say Brown resisted every step of the way, disregarding more than 50 citations for code violations and repeatedly ignoring court orders to clean up his property.

The citations targeted his home on 3035 McHenry, as well as several other properties he owned in the neighborhood. One house Brown owned was condemned and torn down, and another soon could undergo the same fate.

"Obviously, this man is habitually noncompliant," said Edward Cunningham, a city code enforcement manager. "If a man is not going to take care of his property for years, it can't go on ad nauseam."

For a while, though, it seemed Brown's saga just might.

Brown argued with building inspectors who came to his house and is accused of chasing one off his property with a metal pipe.

The city could do little about Brown for years because of a dispute over ownership of the properties, many of which were in the name of his deceased mother. Brown denied that he was responsible for maintaining the properties, but a probate court eventually ruled otherwise.

Mock sent Brown to jail for a month in August and again for two more months near the end of last year. The judge said Brown could afford to maintain his property but was too stubborn to do it.

"This wasn't a case where he couldn't do it," Mock said. "He just chose not to."

He finally relented when Mock threatened him with more jail time. The city paid a contractor about $3,000 to remove the junk, then put a lien on Brown's home for that amount.

Cunningham said the tough stand with Brown has carried over to other building-code violators. He said the number of criminal complaints filed in housing cases rose to 260 last year, up from about 100 in 2006.

CITY USED WARRANTS

Cunningham said building inspectors also use administrative search warrants to help them get access to more properties. The warrants must be approved by a judge and allow only a walk-through inspection - not a search.

But Cunningham said they are useful in identifying trouble spots and gathering evidence for criminal complaints.

He said there is a growing sense of urgency because the housing crisis has led to more foreclosures and more neglect of properties.

"What you're seeing here is the result of these new, aggressive code-enforcement techniques that we're using. We're going after these properties in new ways."

Mary Kuhl, co-founder of the neighborhood group Westwood Concern, remains skeptical. She complained for years about Brown's property, while Brown blamed her for unnecessarily stirring up trouble.

"The city allowed him to become the problem he became," Kuhl said. "The jury, to me, is still out on if this is going to solve the problem."

Cunningham said the city will keep an eye on Brown's property.

"It's clean now," he said. " Keeping it that way is the challenge."

Posted: Fri May 30, 2008 4:59 pm Post subject:

The article doesn't address the interior of his home. I'm concerned for the first responders who will attempt to rescue him when his house catches fire. What unseen obsticles/dangers will they face? I wonder how close the neighbors are--is there anything within the house that will attempt to get out (vermin, biological hazards, flames, smoke, odors) that affect or could affect them? The authorities have only dealt with half the problem--the problem they see. Its the unseen problem that can be deadly and hazardous to others!